Ben Lost It At The Movies . . . No, Not That!*
Oh my goodness, but this is pee-in-your-pants hilarious. Ben Shapiro, who used to be America’s Worst Law Student™, and then America’s Worst Law Firm Associate™, and then America’s Worst Unemployed Self-Employed Lawyer™, now has enough time on his hands that we wants to add another “Worst” to his collection of sobriquets: America’s Worst Movie Reviewer™ — a title that previously appeared to be the unassailable lifetime property of Debbie Scheißelkopf. I’m sure that the universal reaction to Ben’s effort to attract the attention of the Cahiers du Cinema crowd will be something on the order of “Don’t kwicher day job, Ben,” which would be good advice if Ben actually had a day job to quit.
So without further ado, here are a few selections from Ben’s list of the “Top Ten Most Overrated Directors of All Time.” Ben starts out with Ridley Scott. It would be irresponsible not to speculate why Ben believes that Gladiator is Scott’s best film, but we think it may have something to do with this or maybe this. It might also have something to do with the reason that the only part of Thelma and Louise that Ben liked was watching the two women drive off a cliff.
Here’s all we have on Number 9 on Ben’s list:
9. Michael Mann: All style, no substance.
That would be a fairly adequate description of Ben’s own assessment of Michael Mann, and the other nine directors on the list for that matter, at least if you take out the style part.
Number 8 on Ben’s list is David Lean. All his movies are “tooooo long,” Ben complains. This is likely because Ben saw Doctor Zhivago before Herb and Sylvia Shapiro finally got him a Ritalin prescription. And also because it’s about falling in love with a girl.
And then we get to Darren Aronofsky, number 7 on the list, who seems sort of out-of-place compared to the other heavyweights but was likely included on the list so Ben could talk about, eeeeewww, lesbians and how revolting their sexual practices are.
Of late, Aronofsky has been spicing up his chaotic, disordered crap with explicit lesbian sex scenes. … Requiem for a Dream is noteworthy only in that Aronofsky somehow convinced Jennifer Connolly to participate in a lesbian scene involving mutual anal sex and a dildo. … The fanboy press is already agog over rumors that his newest ode to depravity, Black Swan, will feature a sex scene between Natalie Portman and Mila Kunis. Clearly, his target audience is pathetic losers in college dorms looking for an excuse to watch girl-on-girl action in the name of art.
Which is way worse than pathetic losers looking for an excuse to watch some shirtless gladiator-on-gladiator action.
Mike Nichols takes the honor of being number 6, even though the only part of the Nichols’s oeuvre apparently known to Ben isThe Graduate. This is a bit surprising since you have to imagine that Shapiro intersperses his viewings of gladiator movies with private shout-along viewings of Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf. (“What a dump!” Who said that George?” “She’s a housewife. She buys things.”) And Shapiro has a little narrative advice for Nichols worthy of Kurosawa himself:
The ending of that movie alone makes it unworthy of human viewing. All future directors take note: having your main characters staring blankly into nothingness is not an ending. It is a cop out.
Watching two feminist lesbobitches drive a car over a cliff — now that is an ending!
Next on the list at number 5 is David Lynch, and we’re back to Ben’s visceral disgust at touching girly parts:
[Mulholland Drive] makes no sense, doesn’t try to make sense, and then fills the vacuum with Naomi Watts and Laura Harring feeling each other up.
Let’s skip to number 3, Woody Allen, for yet another unintentionally autobiographical remark by Ben:
He’s a whiny narcissist with sexual inferiority issues. And no one except for him cares about the status of his penis.
Martin Scorsese, number 2, prompts Ben to butch it up for a moment with a little valley-girl-speak: Scorsese is “gross.” Gnarly, too. Also.
And the most overrated director of all time is . . . . Alfred Hitchcock. Uh huh. That just speaks for itself. There’s no way I can possibly add any snark to that. Ever. Really.
Finally, it’s interesting that Ben’s list doesn’t include any Frenchislamasocialist or Germanohomomarxist directors in his list. Wouldn’t any furruhn director be overrated just by definition? Where’s that incestophile Louis Malle? Eric Rohmer just died, so doesn’t he deserve at least one short little witty aperçu from Ben about one of his trademarked yakitty-yak-fests (with the yakking in French no less.) And Herzog. I mean Werner Fucking Herzog, where the fuck is he on this list? Surely Ben doesn’t think he’s underrated.
That’s probably because Ben had never seen this newly discovered short by Herzog.
[Hat tips to Pinko Punko, J—, and Loneoak]
*Cf.
The self-pwnage will likely never stop. You are just going to have to get used to the fact that Ben is his own worst enemy, and always will be.
Curious George + Werner = MASTERPIECE!
~
Thanks for the link, Tintin. I have Loneoak to thank for that one.
Hitchcock directed one one-hour episode of The Alfred Hitchcock Hour.
Alfred Hitchcock Presents was a half-hour show.
So the half-hour Hitchcock Hour was the best hour of Hitchcock you could ever hope to see?
Hour-over-hour would you say it compares to the best hour of Hitchcock ever filmed, released in the theater? Which hour would that be, of Hitchcock.
How many hours did Hitchcock direct, and did he record his hours correctly?
These and more questions I eagerly await the answers to, limited to one-hour responses formatted for a half-hour segment.
Umm, Ben? Perhaps I can change your mind about Hitchcock.
Wow! Just wow. I can’t even imagine what kind of soulless drudge would come up with all of those. Hitchcock! Scorsese! Allen! We aren’t even talking about difficult or frequently incomprehensible directors (well maybe Lynch).
Oh and where is F#@$ Roman Polanski? Surely he could work up Ben’s ire. And what about that socialist Swede Bergman? Ben probably thinks Attack of the Clones is teh best Star Wars.
Now, I’m not getting off the boat so I dunno whether this is appropriate. How can he possibly not have included Almodovar? It’s all boobies and stuff, y’know?
Ben probably thinks Attack of the Clones is teh best Star Wars.
We have no idea whether Ben is secretly a furry. But it would be irresponsible not to speculate about his JarJar Binks fetish.
WP is the #1 most overrated blogware. FYWP
Adding to queue.
Who, then, are the greatest directors of all time? Mel Gibson? The guy who directed the “Left Behind” movies?
He’s got pretty much every major American and British director on his “most overrated” list. Obviously dude doesn’t watch foreign films, because you know Kurosawa, Truffaut, Fellini and Bergman would be on there.
Credit should be given to S.McG (if that is his real name!) for further prior mockery of the Virgin Movie Critic.
Also.
~
Surely he must have hated “300”, because I don’t think I’ve ever seen a mainstream movie more obviously gay, outside of the Joel Schumaker-directed Batman & Robin & Nipples & Crotches.
Wow. Am I the only one who thinks that Shapiro would find Cliff Notes too deep of a read?
I want to see Ben’s top ten most underrated directors.
My guess is Michael Bay gets #1. Pow! Ka-blooie!!
Getting credit for writing nearly nothing is swell.
Now, I’m not getting off the boat so…
In this instance I would strongly encourage those inclined to Stay in the Boat to Read the Whole Thing. The stupidity builds on itself.
bag of hammers.
“Requiem for a Dream is noteworthy only in that Aronofsky somehow convinced Jennifer Connolly to participate in a lesbian scene involving mutual anal sex and a dildo (the scene, by the way, is meant to be depraved, but therein lies Aronofsky’s problem: he’s got to have sympathetic characters before we feel bad for them).”
I think I see where the problem with sympathy is coming from here.
SRM, hammers have heads… Box of fur balls.
You know who is truly under-rated as a director, whether or not he actually was a producer or not? Chuck Norris.
Alien is SLOW? What the fuck, does this turd not understand suspense?
He’s right that Tarantino sucks though. I am pleased nobody’s disagreed with him on that yet. QT is a hack.
ZRM, I meant ZRM, Unless Sir Rotten McDonald is okay…
I prefer to sympathize exclusively with unsympathetic characters. It’s hard to find the right greeting cards.
God, I hope he never tries to watch the original Russian version of Solaris, a film mainly about staring depressedly down barren metal hallways for long minutes at a time.
does this turd not understand suspense?
Clearly, no.
This concludes another edition of SA2SQ.
I’m guessing Tony Scott got a pass because he did “Top Gun.”
Ride into the Dangerzone, indeed.
Oooh, Solaris. That’s a great one.
New game: movies Ben would hate, and his one sentence review.
Wings of Desire – “So the angel gave up all his power to be a normal human? Black and white sucks. The angel shoulda killed some Mooslims with a flaming sword.”
He doesn’t understand much. You pretty much have to watch Hitchcock in context. The reason most of his suspenseful film tricks look cliche is that everyone who ever made a decent suspense film used techniques that Hitchcock developed.
Most of his plots don’t make much sense anymore, with no-fault divorce and all. A woman standing in place and screaming for her hero to come rescue her from the tree branch that grabbed her jacket while they were being chased by a murderer is—-I’m happy to say—completely incomprehensible now. But to say that Hitchcock is an overrated director is not to understand what directors do.
He left out Michael Moore?
But-but-but Michael Moore is FAT!
Notorious is the same movie as Rebecca. Has he even seen either movie?
WTF???
Pffft. Hitchcock. Makes a movie about a bunch of crows. Woo. Scary. Fag.
the original Russian version of Solaris, a film mainly about staring depressedly down barren metal hallways for long minutes at a time.
What about Barry Lyndon, a movie in which you spend endless minutes watching people walk from one side of a room to the other. Great flick, but not speedy, you know?
Wings of Desire – “So the angel gave up all his power to be a normal human? Black and white sucks. The angel shoulda killed some Mooslims with a flaming sword.”
That’s THREE sentences! I’ll give it a whirl, though:
Rashomon – “Repetitive film that embraces relativism.”
I do have to say I thought David Lynch’s Dune was really bad.
Like a schmuck, I went and looked. Can’t say everyone of these directors have aced every piece of work, but dayum, the blanket indictment is pretty brutual, individually and/or collectively. Guess Zemekis won’t show up for an added extra-credit # 11, looks like “Stupid is as stupid does.” ATTS, from here on out. Dammit.
Let me say to all and sundry that yes, you should abandon ship immediately immediately. That stuff is comedy fucking gold.
Benji has a crush on Orlando Bloom!
Oh, FFS. Ben’s just trolling for page hits with this. Besides, I get the feeling that his real problem with the “ass to ass” scene is that it didn’t last nearly long enough for him. If the new film really does have a Portman/Kunis scene (and isn’t it curious that, for a director that he considers “overrated”, Ben was completely tapped into that rumor network? It’s the first I’ve heard of it), Ben will be sneaking into every showing of the film that he can manage to, at precisely the right time to catch it, and will be camped out in front of his local Best Buy on the day that they release the Special Unrated Director’s Edition Featuring Certain Extended Scenes If You Know What I Mean Oh Who Am I Kidding Of Course You Do You Dirty Little Wanker Blu-Ray.
I like “Notorious is the same movie as Rebecca.” Wow, that’s a strange thing to say. It’s true that these two were both made when Hollywood was trying to fit him in a “romance” box, but they are wildly different thematically and narratively.
Personally, I’ve always felt “Rear Window” was Hitchcock’s greatest movie. First, he casts movie stars and then makes them rather unpleasant people. There’s a close up of Grace Kelly when she is leaning over to kiss Jimmy Stewart that is so sufficating that you can understand why he’d want to run away.
Then there’s the lovely them of voyeurism that comes right at the beginning of the television age. When Grace Kelly is inside the villain’s apartment, the other heroes get distracted by “another channel” and stop watching her. She is no longer their comrade, but just another competing show.
I thought Ben was writing a review, not his diary in the third person.
Joining the “Ben Reviews” game…
My Dinner with Andre- Watching annoying intellectuals eat is NOT entertaining.
Apocalypse Now- Overblown, pretentious, and liberal just like its stars Brando and Sheen.
Aguire the Wrath of God- Just like Apocalypse Now but without the explosions.
I can’t think of anything more subjective than a list of overrated movie directors. It’s like subjectivity squared. First you have to decide who the most highly rated movie directors are, itself fraught with empirical difficulties, and then compile some “true” internal list of who the best directors really are, and finally compare that to the previous list to find the most “overrated” ones.
And yet still, in such a post-modern exercise of supreme ambiguity and unfettered sheer opinion, Shapiro still manages to somehow be obviously wrong, such that even casual movie watchers can laugh at him.
That’s some kind of accomplishment.
There’s a close up of Grace Kelly when she is leaning over to kiss Jimmy Stewart that is so sufficating that you can understand why he’d want to run away.
I’ve never seen it on a big screen, but someone who has told me that scene elicited a group sigh from the audience, so I guess that’s one of those YMMV thingummies.
I wonder what he thinks of John Waters
I guess his review of “Mission” would be something along the lines of “That stupid priest should have gone all Medieval on those damn Indians instead of playing faggy music.”
Brazil – “liberal trash that badmouths a solid Judeo-christian moral government for protecting its citizens from evil terrorists, and says loving your pretty Mommy is bad.”
If the new film really does have a Portman/Kunis scene (and isn’t it curious that, for a director that he considers “overrated”, Ben was completely tapped into that rumor network? It’s the first I’ve heard of it)
See, Ben’s most common Google search is for “hot gay movie action,” and the enflaccinating thing for him is that occasionally he hears about some lesbo stuff that way by mistake.
Getting credit for writing nearly nothing is swell.
Hey, I realize that not every blogger has the talent necessary to draw a meese.
~
I’m pretty sure he hasn’t even heard of John Waters. You know, teh gay, and all that.
Hey, I realize that not every blogger has the talent necessary to draw a meese.
I see a stomping granny in that mewse’s future.
Ben needs a new haircut, too. He looks like Adric from Dr Who or Solek from Europa Europa, and he’s not cool enough to be either by a mile.
Plus, it’s got Orlando Bloom, who has about as much charisma and credibility as Al Gore.
Mandatory Al Gore/Michael Moore/Ted Kennedy/Barney Frank/Massachusetts non-sequitur insult right out of an internet insult generator? Check.
Scaife foundation cheque in the mail? Check.
ifthethunderdontgetya™³²®© said,
Hey, I realize that not every blogger has the talent necessary to draw a meese.
Especially a meese that is slipping on four banana skins at once. Now that’s suspense.
I think this is Ben’s definition of overrated:
So there you go: people with talent who screw up are not actually people with talent. Would that this applied to, you know, politics.
I have little to add here. He knows nothing about movies, and it shows. He has never seen Lawrence of Arabia or Bridge on the River Kwai in the theater, that’s for sure. The thing that startled me though was that he thought Great Expectations was merely “good”.
I can’t think of anything more subjective than a list of overrated movie directors
Try harder. A list of the 10 most overrated authors?
10 most overrated musical movements? (STARTING WITH PUNK).
“Overrated authors” should start with Fenimore Cooper, since Ben cites Mark Twain’s criticism of Cooper as a black mark against Hitchcock. Apparently the cinematographic medium is subject to the same rules and criticisms as literary creations.
I wouldn’t be surprised if Ben went on to slag Hitchcock for failing to observe Aristotle’s unities of action, time and place. Could check, but that would involve GOTB.
The English Patient — Boo hoo, people having affairs in the desert around the time of WWII and this guy’s a spy for one side and this guy’s a spy for the other and then a dude crashes a plane ’cause it was old and now he’s sad and in the hospital.
Wait, you mean hot girl on girl action isn’t art?
GOTB
Get Out the
VoteButtocksLawrence of Arabia — Waaaah, people don’t treat Arabs right and things get screwed up, look at my gay blue eyes as they look sad.
smut clyde:
Try harder. A list of the 10 most overrated authors?
A list of the 10 most overrated lists of overrated things?
Clearly, his target audience is pathetic losers in college dorms looking for an excuse to watch girl-on-girl action in the name of art.
Ummmmmmmmmmm. Hm.
I realize it’s going on thirty years since I was in a college dorm, unless you count driving my daughter out and yes, I so had hopes of walking in on some girl-on-girl action, but it seems to me that in a college dorm, a guy wouldn’t need the pretext of “It’s art!” to watch some lesbian action.
I saw that list. It’s overrated.
I can’t think of anything more subjective than a list of overrated movie directors
Try harder. A list of the 10 most overrated authors?
10 most overrated musical movements? (STARTING WITH PUNK).
Top ten most overrated floral designers.
Top ten worst “Tabatha’s Salon Takeovers.”
Top ten worst programs on WE or Oxygen
Top ten most ludicrous entertainments broadcast as sports
For those who had the courage to read to the end, this helps explain the Hitchcock thing:
The psychoanalysis at the end of Psycho is laughable.
Okay, the psychiatrist blathering all that Freudian stuff at the end seems rather dated today, but still: who the hell watches “Psycho” and fixates on that five minutes of filler? Perhaps Ben thinks Norman Bates was getting a bum rap.
I didn’t mean to say the closeup of Grace Kelly isn’t beautiful, but rather, she is so beautiful that it feels smothering.
Ben needs to attend cricket practice. There will be no LBW.
who the hell watches “Psycho” and fixates on that five minutes of filler?
The same guys who watch art films in their dorm rooms to whack off to chick porn.
He was expecting a much more realistic explanation of the plot? By the way, I thought conservatives generally felt that killers weren’t worthy of attempts at psychological explanation, they just killed because they were immoral beasts?
Pffft. Hitchcock. Makes a movie about a bunch of crows. Woo. Scary. Fag.
And Hitchcock makes Michael Moore look skinny.
“Citizen Kane” – Orson Welles doesn’t like John McCain. And who the heck is “Rosebud” anyway?
“Casablanca” – Too pro-French.
“The Shawshank Redemption” – Too much coddling of prisoners. Also, needs more prison rape.
“12 Angry Men” – Stupid activist juries.
“The Women” – Damn chicks.
Okay, the psychiatrist blathering all that Freudian stuff at the end seems rather dated today
Ben Shapiro, not only is he an expert on sex, politics and film, he knows more about psychology and psychiatry than anybody EVAH!
“All About Eve” – It’s all about a woman. Who cares?
F(l)ixed.
“The Hours” — A bunch of women whining, and one of them’s got an awful big nose that I hate, and I hate movies with women with big noses.
“Sex and the City” — see above.
Hm, y’know, who’s that other douchenozzle with the top ten lists? You know, the fat ass who’s a cross between Louie Anderson and a chipmunk, and the chipmunk loses?
Him and Ben ought to get a TV show reviewing movies. We could call it “At The Douchies”.
“Midnight Express” – Young man is caught in Turkey smuggling heroin. Hilarity ensues.
John Hawkins is Mr. List.
Actually, thinking on it, I figure VBen would probably have been right at home in the audience sitting thru Stolz der Nation right next to Der Fuhrer in “Inglourious Basterds”.
I didn’t know Nichols directed “Who’s Afraid of Virginia Wolfe”. Intense movie. Still. I love “Catch-22” too, but if you didn’t read the book it might be confusing. Love the way he captures mood states with a camera. There are scenes from “The Graduate” etched in my mind for the ambiance. No amount of story writing could capture this stuff in a movie.
RIGHT! John Porkins! Thanks, Sub.
By the way, at the link? Did you notice Clouthier’s, um, grammatical error?
No amount of story writing could capture this stuff in a movie.
Yes, but you have to remember we’re talking about Ben here, a man who’s storytelling rises to the level of “And then, you know what? And you know what then? Then, and what you know?”
“Casablanca” – Too pro-French.
Also absolutely RIDDLED with cinema cliches, plus it doesn’t even get them all right: hel-LO-o, it’s “play it AGAIN, Sam,” numbnuts.
Altho “Gone With The Wind” probably gets two pseudopodia up from Ben, simply because men were men, women were ladies, and darkies were slaves.
“Bonnie & Clyde” – Although it has an inspiring ending, it’s mostly an attempt by hollywood communists to make the FBI look bad.
You get the sense Ben still hasn’t got over that time at age eight when he walked in on Mommy and Daddy doing the nasty.
Nope. You mean Type-Cast? She’s got dumber things as you scroll down.
“Dr. Strangelove” – What, Kubrick couldn’t afford color film? It would ruin the picture if there was anything to ruin.
Yup. Typed cast was what caught my eye.
“Dr. Strangelove” – What, Kubrick couldn’t afford color film? It would ruin the picture if there was anything to ruin.
He probably blew the budget on the full title, Ben: “Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb”
“The General” – This one doesn’t even have sound! How can you tell what’s going on and who the real hero is?
How about the radio chatter towards the end of Silence of the Lambs talking about how “years of systematic abuse” had made Jame Gumb into what he was—the exact opposite of what Harris wrote in the novel? You’d think Ben would be all over that left-wing psychobabble.
Personal note: Unlike every other movie ever, I actually read Silence of the Lambs before I saw the movie. But when I read it, I knew Anthony Hopkins was playing Hannibal Lecter, so I had a picture in my mind of how he would deliver some of the lines, and he went in a totally different direction. So, since according to Virgin Ben, any movie that doesn’t go the way I want it is overrated, put Demme on the list.
“Modern Times” – You can’t make interesting characters out of poor people. Besides, if he can’t keep a job it’s his own fault.
Pat Robertson Voodo Doll for Haiti. On sale Now!
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=190365539998&ssPageName=ADME:L:LCA:US:1123
“The Grapes of Wrath” – Great, more glorifying poor people. They should just get jobs.
At some point in his life, Ben needed a chunky Reese Witherspoon-type — but clearly, it was not to be.
I wish people would stop saying “Chunky Reese Witherspoon” all the time—now I have to remain seated for the next 15 minutes or so.
Pat Robertson….
That reminds me – has everyone seen the Salvation Army’s home page lately?
They’ll probably claim it was hacked, after they get torn new ones.
Ben Shapiro’s Top Ten Film Directors:
10. McG
9. Jason Apuzzo
8. Cecil B. DeMille
7.
6.
5.
4. D.W. Griffith
3. John Milius
2. George Lucas
1. Mel Gibson
PeeJ, what’s wrong with it?
Ben Shapiro’s Top Ten Film Directors:
10. McG
9. Jason Apuzzo
8. Cecil B. DeMille
7. Geert Wilders
6. Theo van Gogh
5. Roman Polanski
4. D.W. Griffith
3. John Milius
2. George Lucas
1. Mel Gibson
Ben Shapiro’s Top Ten Film Directors:
10. McG
9. Jason Apuzzo
8. Cecil B. DeMille
7. Renny Harlan
6.
5.
4. D.W. Griffith
3. John Milius
2. George Lucas
1. Mel Gibson
There’s a conservativeflix.com. “Castaway” is on the list.
“Keep in mind folks…there is no government there to bail ol’ Tom out on this island. No “hope and change” just sand, coconut trees, and whole hell of a lot of water. Once his character realizes ain’t nobody coming to pick him up…he has to take it up a notch.
So why do I like these kind of movies? I just want to be the guy on the island that can say…Hey y’all! I saw this in a movie once! Wouldn’t that be cool? I mean to totally find a neat way to catch fish, or make a compass, or build a raft?”
I don’t think the movie’s point was that being stranded alone on a desert island was cool or that human intervention on behalf of the unfortunate hinders creative fish catching. I get the feeling that a lot of conservatives don’t really WATCH movies, they’re just looking for the validation for their political views anywhere they can find it.
Yay!
Of course the only part of Requiem for a Dream the Virgin Ben remembers is ASS TO ASS. That was certainly such an erotic, fappable descent into a short life of endless misery.
Seriously, fuck this dude. Based on that and his remarks about the ending of The Graduate, I believe Virgin Ben has some kind of personality disorder where he’s incapable of understanding human emotion.
LOTR: Xena without lesbian subtext.
PeeJ, what’s wrong with it?
Lamest parody troll EVAH!
Is he wearing a Star Trek uniform behind that toilet?
LOTR: Xena without lesbian subtext
Oh come on! Really?
What about “Merry” and “Pippin”? Huh? Not lesbian, you say?
actor: Renny Harlin might have fucked up a lot of times, but I’ll give him a pass for The Long Kiss Goodnight. fapfapfap. fap.
Djur, OK, but Die Hard 2 offsets that completely, so we’re at a Messican stand off.
Well, a fat bowl and the fast forward button allows you to extract some enjoyment out of Cutthroat Island, too. But then he did the Ford Fairlane movie, which is an unforgivable act. OK, fine, fuck that guy.
his newest ode to depravity, Black Swan, will feature a sex scene between Natalie Portman and Mila Kunis.
Sounds like a winner to me. Anyone know when the advance tickets go on sale?
@acter212
4 word movie reviews!
Avatar:Pocahontas sings the blues
Four word movie reviews?
Where was the memo?
OK
Inglourious Basterds: Longest two hours evah!
I must admit that I hated Mulholland Drive.
Sherlock Holmes: Super Mario Holmes, Peachless.
Sounds like a winner to me. Anyone know when the advance tickets go on sale?
If that’s not a “home dvd experience,” then what, pray tell, is?
I mostly dislike David Lynch. There’s no need to say everything Shapiro writes is wrong, but if he’s correct it’s unlikely to be because he understood what he was looking at.
Big Hollywood Editor-in-Chief John Nolte gives Ben Shapiro a big Thumbs Up.
Nolte:
Here’s hoping he stops reviewing films.
Are you really gonna make me click that link to find out why the former(?) virgin Ben thinks Hitchcock is overrated? Neurotic homosexual characters in Rope or Strangers on a Train hit too close to home?
Thanks, Substance. I guess.
Ben looks a little like Norman Bates, doesn’t he? Think he maybe goes for a little dress-up from time to time?
“Mother, you’ve got to let me have a night out for myself once in a while!”
“Now, Benjamin, I’m just doing what’s best for you. Mother loves you best, Benjamin.”
“I love you, too, Mother…”
OK, ideas then people: films you would have Ben watch, if you had him strapped to a chair with his eyes held open like Malcolm McDowell in ‘A Clockwork Orange’. I recommend:
1) ‘Angels In America’ – a gay fantasia! And the bad guy is a gay Republican. Might be a bit close to home.
2) ‘The Battle Of Algiers’ – the terrorists win!
3) ‘The Battle Of Chile’ – Ben obviously loves long films, so this seven hour documentary filmed guerilla-style as Pinochet’s coup was taking place would be perfect entertainment for him.
And then, just to piss him off really, I’d make him watch something garish and full of depravity like ‘Sweet Movie’ or ‘Pink Flamingos’. Ah, if only! Ideas on a postcard please.
Bitter Moon – Depraved, French and Polanski. It’s a trifecta!
Who directed those venereal disease movies they used to show in high school health classes?
Nolte:
And I’m tired of being told what to like. I’m tired of being told that this director’s important or that film has something to say…
Here’s hoping he stops reviewing films.
Wait, what? So he gives kudos for being told “here’s what you shouldn’t like, which directors aren’t important, and which films have GROSS stuff to say?” Oh those inscrutable wingnuggets!
Neurotic homosexual characters in Rope or Strangers on a Train hit too close to home?
Hee!
West Side Story: Right, like thugs can dance.
You get the sense Ben still hasn’t got over that time at age eight when he walked in on Mommy and Daddy doing the nasty.
Not bloody likely. By the time Ben was three or four, Herb & Sylvia would have realized it was their responsibility not to pollute the gene pool further, & would have been in separate bedrooms, lest their DNA mingle again.
Yeah, I’m not crazy about a couple of directors on the list—so what? Some of the ones I do like had an off day or two—so what? All this is just my taste. The Coen Brothers did Fargo, one of the greatest movies of all time. And Raising Arizona was pretty good, too. I must admit that I’ve never been able to make it throughThe Big Lebowski or O, Brother, Where art Thou, but both movies have fanatical fans.
(The title O, Brother Where art Thou came from one of the movies on my top 10 list—Sullivan’s Travels. Most underrated director of all time—Preston Sturges. Bring out your flensing knives, I’m ready for you.)
Some people like things I don’t like, and some people don’t like things I like. The difference between me and the Ben Shapiros of the world is, I’ve got no problem with that. We were searching for a definition of “Liberal” in the last thread—I think that nails it.
Note also the name of the Salvation Army header: “Disaster Theater.”
Most underrated director of all time—Preston Sturges. Bring out your flensing knives, I’m ready for you
I think the only debate would be on the “most.” It would be hard to deny he’s underrated.
Spartacus: This sucked because it’s totally unrealistic that so many people, even a bunch of worthless Roman slaves, couldn’t remember who was who.
I like both of those. The Ladykillers really sucked.
“Castaway!” That movie still bothers me when I wonder why the guy didn’t strike together the blades of the ice-skates to make a spark. I writhed in irritation all thru the movie. Those blades were a gift from God.
Once again, an expression of opinion by anyone else is considered an attempt to “force something down someone’s throat.” Guy must get into a lot of bar fights.
Who directed those venereal disease movies they used to show in high school health classes?
Robert Altman, when he was starting out in Kansas City .
We Combat Natural Disasters With Acts Of God
Bless their theomilitaristic little hearts, that’s some priceless sloganeering!
Not just for cramming the word “combat” in there (that’s to be expected given their org name) but for the sheer cognitive dissonance of an omnipotent deity needing to do battle against his own creation’s oopsies, yet somehow helpless until actuated by an army of bucketshaking panhandlers waving Gideon’s bibles.
The mind reels.
The Chuck character in “Castaway” could not have survived or left the island without random manufactured stuff that floated ashore. I thought that was kind of the point. His survival depended on other people. Also, the ability to personify Wilson and the picture of his girlfriend kept him from going insane with loneliness. No man is an island…even if he’s stuck on an island all by himself.
A 36-hour non-stop Eric Rohmer film marathon, with free double-jumbo Mountain Dews and locked bathrooms.
Live coverage of the Texas State Board of Education textbook hearings, with a Japanese tentacle porn soundtrack as background.
David Cronenberg’s Naked Lunch, with dialogue narrated by Laura Bush.
Enver Hoxha propaganda films, no subtitles.
I’m waiting for the Slavoj Zizek reads Curious George. video so I know how I’m supposed to think about it.
Off the actually read the comments here now.
I love how he calls Tarantino a child, presumably because Real Men don’t care about women, and Tarantino has that unfortunate habit of making movies based around interesting female characters who kick ass.
There was a point to Castaway? Guess I was too irritated to see it.
Terminator 3: Although I like the part where the lady robot’s boobs grew, I never could stop being offended by how they had violated the sacred dead at the mausoleum.
Not much of a point, besides we take too much for granted, humans are social critters, chance plays a huge part in our fates, and time is only money in a monetary system.
films you would have Ben watch, if you had him strapped to a chair with his eyes held open like Malcolm McDowell in ‘A Clockwork Orange’
Weekend
Lizstomania, although he might like Roger Daltry riding the giant penis a bit to much.
Kubrick’s The shining. I really really hate this movie. The mini-series was much better. Oversized croquet mallets and moving topiary figures are much creepier than axes and mazes.
Speaking as an ADHD sufferer, I gotta say: this whole mental illness stigma thing sucks hard enough without your folding the Shapiro taint into it.
Remember, it’s the Internet: however small the group you wind up giving grief to, some are in the audience; it’s impossible to share a laugh at some group’s expense behind their backs.
Besides, the joke is of the “off their meds” genre of gags that stopped being funny a long time ago.
Antichrist.
Triumph of the Will: A likeable lead character, great costumes, and not a speck of multiculturalism. Almost as much fun as Porky’s II!
Omen III – The Final Conflict: An inspiring dream of a new America, free of liberal tripe.
The Seventh Seal: Would have been much better with Abbott and Costello. And why isn’t anyone speaking English?
Plan 9 from Outer Space: The superb screenplay and magnificent cast are fatally undermined by the lack of explosions and car chases.
The original The Ladykillers was brilliant. I couldn’t see the point of remaking it.
The Coen’s The Ladykillers wasn’t terrible, just unnecessary. It’s one of only two Coen films (the other being Hudsucker Proxy) that, if directed by any one of the vast majority of other directors, would not be considered a high water mark of that director’s career. Best directing team ever.
I enjoyed Hudsucker Proxy. Also, Intolerable Cruelty.
Shapiro is really a piece of work. He probably thinks Grace Kelly is a negative in Rear Window.
Let me guess, if he had any idea about old movies, his favorite director would be John Ford, but I doubt he goes back that far. Too Irish maybe. He probably loves Claudette Colbert, too.
I’d disagree. It hardly made it into my memory at all really, a rare thing for any movie. I recall myself thinking “What the hell?” after leaving the theatre more clearly than I recall the film.
I too enjoyed Hudsucker, except for the ersatz Rosalind Russell.
Blood Simple — evil cheating wife cheats on simple honest businessman and gets away with it.
Blood Simple is the greatest movie about not talking I’ve ever seen.
The problem is, he thinks “Back Door Destruction” is the sequel to “Rear Window.”
See what I did there? That’s comedy. It’s all about the timing.
@snorghagen:
films you would have Ben watch, if you had him strapped to a chair with his eyes held open like Malcolm McDowell in ‘A Clockwork Orange’
A 36-hour non-stop Eric Rohmer film marathon, with free double-jumbo Mountain Dews and locked bathrooms.
Live coverage of the Texas State Board of Education textbook hearings, with a Japanese tentacle porn soundtrack as background.
David Cronenberg’s Naked Lunch, with dialogue narrated by Laura Bush.
Enver Hoxha propaganda films, no subtitles.
Holy shit, that right there is a flight of fancy. I tip an imaginary hat.
Ford was a lieberal… and he frequently treated John Wayne with contempt. Unthinkable! Absurd!
You could tell them that, but it’d go in one ear and out the other—just like when you tell them the Pledge of Allegiance was written by a Utopian Socialist and that “under God” wasn’t in there for the first 60 years.
I thought I was the only person on the planet who liked Hudsucker Proxy.
I’ve never seen it, but I know a few people who liked it.
I can certainly imagine left-wing critiques of the way lesbianism is used in the movies: assumes the male gaze, exploitative of women, removes female agency and so on.
But is Shapiro seriously trying to get the wingnut base riled up on the grounds that naked women making out makes a movie bad?
Good luck with that, Ben, but I think you might be swimming upstream on this one. You might have better luck if you went after the machine guns and explosives first.
Though it doesn’t really melt my butter, I’d take a lesbian scene over the requisite vomiting scene anytime.
I must admit that I’ve never been able to make it throughThe Big Lebowski or O, Brother, Where art Thou, but both movies have fanatical fans.
I just saw O, Brother, Where art Thou for the first time this Xmas. I have to say I liked Clooney’s hamming, the soundtrack was excellent, and I’d watch it again.
~
I have to join in the chorus…how on earth did John Waters and Roman Polanski not make his stupid list?!
I hated Intolerable Cruelty, though I generally love the Coen Brothers.
I loved Mulholland Drive, though admittedly it is impossible to watch the first time and have any idea wtf is going on. I’m going to go out on a limb and speculate that Benji doesn’t like to think about movies, and just likes lots of explosions.
As for hating Aronofsky, what the hell, is he high? Pi is one of my favorites of all time.
And there’s a Conservativeflix??? LOL. So much for the Invisible Hand and the free market deciding what succeeds hehe. What is it, all Lassie and Ozzie & Harriet?
I thought I was the only person on the planet who liked Hudsucker Proxy.
I like it in general and love beyond reason Peter Gallagher’s two minutes in it.
I want to plant Ben in a theater to watch a Jacques Rivette film festival, starting with Out 1. With NO bathroom in the theater. And the exit doors locked.
The Salvation Army’s front page is taking direct aim at Pat Robertson. I know several salvation army majors and to a person they condemn Robertson’s words and theological bent. They’re good people doing real charitable work. You may not believe what they believe, but they help a lot of people. Hell, they don’t even give me shit for being a Unitarian.
I’ll admit to one thing – I detest Requiem For A Dream, but not for any of Ben’s reasons. I’ve known a few drug addicts, and their lives are much more like the tragicomic Born To Win than Aronofsky’s puerile fantasies. Amusingly, the addicts I knew loved RFOAD. They all had a good cry.
How did Orson Welles not make his list? After all, isn’t CITIZEN KANE an anti-capitalist, anti-American screed by an arty, un-sufficiently-patriotic director that is still regarded as one of the world’s greatest movies?
Pi was really good, but as a migraine sufferer I found it hit a little close to home.
“I’m guessing Tony Scott got a pass because he did `Top Gun.’”
Had to be, because Scott is permanently on my worst list.
“There’s a close up of Grace Kelly when she is leaning over to kiss Jimmy Stewart that is so sufficating that you can understand why he’d want to run away.”
Hmm, well, when the only societal option even an accomplished woman has is to get married-or-else, it’s small wonder she’s putting the full-court-press on him. And if he didn’t want Lisa around, why didn’t he tell her to get lost instead of stringing her along?
“The psychoanalysis at the end of Psycho is laughable.”
IIRC, Hitchcock didn’t expect anyone to take it seriously. The point is that psychoanalysis can’t really explain Bates–which makes him even more terrifying.
… speculate that Benji doesn’t like to think about movies
[Fixxification needed]
Nobody tell him about Godard.
One must speculate who exactly it is he does like.
Or Malick for that matter.
Ben Shapiro doesn’t strike me so much as being a closeted gay as he does being the kind of guy who keeps women in a pit and telling them, “It puts the lotion on its skin.”
Little Ben doesn’t mention Welles, but fellow Big Hollywood wingnut John Nolte (see the link at 0:44) says that his ‘real part’ knows that Citizen Kane just can’t measure up to Death Wish II or Abbott and Costello.
I’m not sure what Nolte means by ‘the real part of me’. His soul? His dick? Whatever it is, his point seems to be that truly authentic people prefer crappy movies.
The Coen’s The Ladykillers wasn’t terrible, just unnecessary.
I’d disagree. It hardly made it into my memory at all really, a rare thing for any movie. I recall myself thinking “What the hell?” after leaving the theatre more clearly than I recall the film
Two things stuck out in my mind, otherwise I totally agree. First, the lady in question reminded me of Momma in both temperment, speech patterns and awareness. Secondly, Tom Hanks nailed the whole slightly-creepy-Southern-literature-professor-from-a-third-rate-community-college. But that’s just me.
He really said that? All they’d have to do is tape my eyes open and force me to watch that whole “Who’s on first?” routine all the way through and I’d tell them anything they wanted to know.
He really did, along with a lot of other stupid-ass shit.
Re: Ford, I wonder if there were any Shapiros around back in the day shitting blood that “The Informer” painted a sympathetic portrait of TEH TERRORISTS. Even if there were, I somehow doubt the sleaziest Hearst-employed film critic could write as insufferably as Shappy the Squirrel.
i’ve had the distinct…pleasure? of working with werner herzog on various projects. wheel of time, rescue dawn, a few others.
a) that is a TERRIBLE imitation, not even close.
b) while he is not exactly easy to deal with (to put a thing with such an excess of mildness that it becomes the very synecdoche of mildness, nay the mehtonomy of that which is most mild) he in fact drops more bon mots, turns of phrase, and astounding observations into casual conversation than anyone since, one supposes, oscar wilde.
When i mentioned to him that he might want to check out a bruce chatwin autobiography for a movie, he said (and this is literally how it ALWAYS was with him): “ah yes, bruce, when he was dying of AIDS he gave me his rucksack and told me it would bring me great luck. later i was on top of a mountain in the andes etc. etc. ad infinitum AND THAT RUCKSACK SAVED MY LIFE.”
always. i’ve yet to take his advice to walk across a continent (“robert, any of them will do”) but i will. oh yes, i will.
The other other stupid-ass shit.
The Titanic gets him all wet for Leonardo? hmmmmmm
http://nothingiswrittenfilm.blogspot.com/2010/01/this-post-is-overrated.html
“Neurotic homosexual characters in Rope or Strangers on a Train hit too close to home?”
Hurm, I’d say the impotent woman-hating Nicholson character in CARNAL KNOWLEDGE was the shot-through-the-heart for Ben as regards Mike Nichols.
The Beatles suck, but he’ll give due credit to “DC Cab.”
Dear God.
“Barton Fink” was the worst. “Miller’s Crossing” didn’t make any sense. A bunch of people ended up dead because he didn’t want to repay a chump change loan? I liked certain things about “The Ladykillers”, I howled when the lady found Hanks under the bed and I howled when Wayans showed up at the end of Hanks’ monologue. And I loved the bargain-basement criminal mastermind aspect. I liked Jennifer Jason Leighs’ Hepburn in “The Hudsucker Proxy” and the drawings of the circles (“Its, you know, for kids.”). I realize now that I must be a Coen brothers fan, because I saw “Blood Simple” in the theatre when it was first released.
3. I can name ten Abbott and Costello movies funnier than Duck Soup.
Are there ten funny Abbott & Costello movies? Africa Screams and Meet Frankenstein are the only two funny ones I can think of. The rest make the Baby Jesus cry.
Oh, that conservativeflix.com site is just precious. Right now the second post is a Budweiser “wassup” Star Wars parody clip. Because nothing screams relevance like a parody of a commercial series that hasn’t aired since ’02. What’s next, an Obama/”where’s the beef?” mashup?
A little late to the party here, but holy crap it’s hilarious to see the very serious opinions of a man who clearly knows nothing about movies.
Although, in his defense, I do agree that The Birds is a terrible, terrible film.
Omen III – The Final Conflict: An inspiring dream of a new America, free of liberal tripe.
I am not convinced that it is strictly ethical for Damien to review his own biopic.
here’s a good trivia question about that last sequence in Psycho…
What actor played the cop who is guarding Norman Bates’ jail cell?
I want to plant Ben in a theater to watch a Jacques Rivette film festival
I am well on the way to wearing out the video shop’s copy of Céline and Julie Go Boating.
Which one is Jacques Rivette? Did he do that movie that has Emanuelle Beart naked most of the movie posing for the artist guy who’s married to the taxidermist that can never find her shoes?
“Invictus“: Pure fiction. Not even good fiction, I mean, who could believe that story?
don’t know if anyone else commented on it, but did anyone notice that ben’s knowledge of female anatomy is so low that he automatically assumed that the dildo scene in requiem involved anal?
Well, the mind sees what it wants to see…
THAT’S NOT A GUN BARREL!!!
Did he do that movie that has Emanuelle Beart naked most of the movie posing for the artist guy who’s married to the taxidermist that can never find her shoes?
I did not get to the second half of this sentence, but the answer is probably Yes.
I think he lost it well before he ever got to the movies – & he plainly has no interest in ever getting it back.
Like VB, I’m a dolt on the subject of cinema (the last time I paid to see a movie in a theater the ticket was well under $10, my tastes generally vary from the tacky to the baffling, & my expertise is nil) … unlike VB, I don’t opt to inflict my Ignint McNuggets of wisdom concerning said topic on semi-random innocent Interwebs grazers.
Upcoming “Attractions” –
Ben’s take on Quantum Theory: Math is so ghey – & besides, all those hoity-toity science-nerds don’t know what they’re talking about! Whatever happened to the good old days of arguing over angels dancing on the head of a pin? THAT stuff was AWESOME!
ALL QUIET ON THE WESTERN FRONT: Boo hoo, war is hell, heard it before, when will Hollywood stop trying to stop young healthy men from volunteering to serve in the military and keep their country safe (and I am doing valuable work right here thankyewverymuch). The sequel was a bit more patriotic though.
Also absolutely RIDDLED with cinema cliches, plus it doesn’t even get them all right: hel-LO-o, it’s “play it AGAIN, Sam,” numbnuts.
he thinks Hamlet is too full of quotes.
dumbest fucking list I’ve ever read. This is what eating paint chips does to you.
Ted Knight ! Famous for playing Ted Baxter (“A little song, a little dance, a little seltzer down your pants.”) Good night and good news.
I’m not sure what Nolte means by ‘the real part of me’.
The stuff he flushes with regularity.
don’t know if anyone else commented on it, but did anyone notice that ben’s knowledge of female anatomy is so low that he automatically assumed that the dildo scene in requiem involved anal?
That’s not his ignerts of the female anatomy.
That’s his own personal sexual experience speaking.
We should probably get Benny to a “Tom Of Finland” film festival for some shock therapy.
“GI Jane is hysterically terrible. Plus, it’s got Orlando Bloom, who has about as much charisma and credibility as Al Gore. ”
Orlando Bloom was not in GI Jane, though I’m sure he was mentioned with the intention of referencing Kingdom of Heaven. Shapiro’s an ignorant moron who can’t bother to edit his own self-important rubbish.
I’m sure V-Ben gave eight thumbs up to “Red Dawn”
Right. That wasn’t Orlando Bloom. Orlando Bloom was the author of all those beloved middle-schooler oriented novels such as Are You There Ilúvatar? It’s Me, Legolas.
Orlando Bloom was the author of all those beloved middle-schooler oriented novels
Fuck. And here I thought he was the protagonist in Joyce’s Ulysses.
I’m sure V-Ben gave eight thumbs up to “Red Dawn”
Three.
Orlando Bloom was the author of all those beloved middle-schooler oriented novels
Fuck. And here I thought he was the protagonist in Joyce’s Ulysses.
Didn’t Virginia Woolf write a scientific essay describing his spontaneous sex change?
Didn’t Virginia Woolf write a scientific essay describing his spontaneous sex change?
I thought that was Thomas Wolfe’s epic “The Lost Boy”?
Joel Schumacher Rocks!!!
Didn’t Virginia Woolf write a scientific essay describing his spontaneous sex change?
I thought that was Thomas Wolfe’s epic “The Lost Boy”?
Subtitled: You Can’t Come Home Again.
Didn’t Virginia Woolf write a scientific essay describing his spontaneous sex change?
Yes, the very engaging Orlando, Furiously
From the comments: “would replace Hitchcock with Orson Wells, but otherwise his list it spot on”…oh, sweet Jesus. I think my head exploded.
Solaris is like Crank 2: High Voltage compared to Stalker.
“If you want to see good Hitchcock, rent Alfred Hitchcock Presents. Restricted to the one hour medium, he’s at his best. Left to his own devices, he’s slightly better than mediocre.”
…
…
Words fail me.
Wait–wait–I’ve got some. “Moronic Shithead!”
“would replace Hitchcock with Orson Wells
Sounds like they’re talking about the swimsuit competition.
You know what? I have contemplated this and what I want to see is how BEN directs a movie.
I mean, he clearly knows his shit because he’s telling us all that he knows his shit. He’s no mere dilettante if he can call out the big shots.
So, Ben, time to put up or shut up. Direct a movie and show us ALL how it’s done, motherfucker.
Direct a movie and show us ALL how it’s done, motherfucker.
Wait! What? Work?!?
I can see it now, Ben’s masterpiece: Red Dawn II: Electric Boogaloo!
what I want to see is how BEN directs a movie.
Yes, but see directors as a group are overrated because it’s the WRITERS that really matter. If only there were some way to discern the quality of his writing…
“The psychoanalysis at the end of Psycho is laughable”
Well to be fair to Hitch here . He didn’t write the words – the analysis at the end of the movie is (if I’m remembering correctly) damn near word for word from the book Psycho by one Robert Bloch. Hitch just did the film.
If only there were some way to discern the quality of his writing…
Hm. Maybe he’s self-published a book and listed it on Amazon.com, where people could post their impressions of the book…
OT (but not really, since reading too much Ben can make you long for death): zombies in your iPhone.
Also, PENIS.
Werner Herzog Reads Curious George
I preferred Werner Herzog Eats His Shoe.
All future directors take note: having your main characters staring blankly into nothingness is not an ending.
Actually, they’re not staring blankly, Benji. Dustin Hoffman’s character maintains a look of blissful happines, but if you pay attention to Katherine Ross, you slowly start to see a bit of doubt creep in, as if she’s starting to think “Did I just do something incredibly stupid?” In other words, they’re not destined to live happily ever after. There’s just no need to see the actual breakup.
Ooh, Stalker. I want to see that. I loved the story.
Orlando Bloom wasn’t that children’s book writer. It was that disco band. Tony Orlando and Bloom. You know, “Tie a Yellow Ribbon ‘Round the Old Treant”
Or I had my terms messed up and the’re called Ents not Treants in LotR. So it’d be Tie an Yellow Ribbon round that old Treebeard.
Tommykey, I haven’t seen the film in a while, but I remember thinking it was more ambiguous than that, a kind of reality-dawning, “Oh God what have we done now what,” there-are-no-happy-ever-afters ending on both of their faces. You are absolutely right that the looks on their faces are not blank stares, though; they are looks fraught with emotion, even if the emotions are too confused and contradictory to pin down exactly.
Any Boston people available to drive some folks to the polls for Coakley? They’re asking for help.
OT: I’ve noticed the calls for Scott Brown have almost all 1)come from a DC area code and 2)been push-polls or hang-ups(the hang-ups are from the same numbers). Coakley’s have all come from Mass area codes, have left messages if we didn’t answer, and been plain vanilla campaign calls.
No, you’re thinking of Orlando Jones. Orlando Bloom was the English literature scholar who urged us to make sure and read the greatest works of the Western Canon, read Samuel Beckett, and maybe even touch Naomi Wolf’s thigh.
God, I hope he never tries to watch the original Russian version of Solaris, a film mainly about staring depressedly down barren metal hallways for long minutes at a time. – El Cid
Fortunately, Ich Ruf Zu Dir Herr Jesu Christ is music one can listen to over and over again. Being the father of a 4.5 year old would be a lot less emotionally draining if kids’ movies had Das Orgelbuchlein as a sound track rather than having the schlock they usually use. I’d much rather have Bach stuck in my head from manifold repeated listenings than whatever music they have on Kid Songs (with the kid-friendly DVD that plays over and over again!).
Black Swan, will feature a sex scene between Natalie Portman and Mila Kunis
Out of mere intellectual curiosity … when is this movie due out?
I am sure my wife will indulge me watching this … in the name of Jewish pride and unity or something.
OT (but not really, since reading too much Ben can make you long for death): zombies in your iPhone.
O good. that’s the fourth zombie game on my phone.
Some of these comments are tempting me not to trust the shorter and click through. I need a sponsor to call when this happens.
In my opinion, he’s just glanced at the credits of Lord of the Rings and thinks Viggo Mortenson (Mortensen?), who was in GI Jane, is Orlando Bloom.
I just clicked through … his comments on Scorsese are particularly telling on the cluelessness that is the “modern” “conservative” “mindset”. I thought it was (c.f. a previous thread) we liberals who were supposed to be naive about human nature and conservatives who were hard-bitten (heh heh, he said “hard bitten”) about ambiguities.
Does Virgin Ben want all movies to be cut and dry melodramas? I wonder if he has seen a certain light opera that I recently saw? if he would be able to parse the words, he’d probably be most offended.
I wonder if Virgin Ben is a character from Gilbert and Sullivan? It would explain a lot …
Bambi- Unsympathetically portrays gun owners
The fanboy press is already agog over rumors that his newest ode to depravity, Black Swan, will feature a sex scene between Natalie Portman and Mila Kunis. Clearly, his target audience is pathetic losers in college dorms looking for an excuse to watch girl-on-girl action in the name of art.
If wanting to watch Natalie Portman and Mila Kunis have sweet lesbian sex makes me a pathetic loser in a college dorm room, then with God as my witness I am a pathetic loser in a college dorm room.
The fanboy press is already agog over rumors that his newest ode to depravity, Black Swan, will feature a sex scene between Natalie Portman and Mila Kunis.
Shouldn’t that be fapboy?
Can’t believe that I go ‘net free for a couple of days and I miss Virgin Ben’s greatest work yet. I guess he wanted to take away Jonah’s long-running claim to “dumbest thing ever written until next time he writes something.”
I’m surprised nobody has pointed this out yet — and poor littlebrained Ben will be upset too, if he should think of it — but he missed his chance by not putting Spike Lee on his silly little list.
Very late to the party, but…Virgin Ben did realize that the “dildo” scene in Requiem wasn’t supposed to be erotic, right?
I mean I understand he has an overwhelming hatred of lady bits and is so far into the closet he’s discovered Narnia and trying to hump Prince Caspian, but, I mean you’d have to be a complete id-
Never mind.
It’s a conservative culture warrior, why would I expect even a modicum of understanding of anything more complex than Red Dawn or even a rudimentary understanding of consent.
Sorry about that. Everyone go about your day.
Ben wrote a follow-up column listing his choices the the 10 greatest directors. William Wyler is ranked #1. No necessarily a bad choice, but does anyone give a rat’s ass who he likes and dislikes?
In any case,he made a few corrections, one with regards to his idiotic claim the “Rebecca” and “Notorious” are the same movie. What he meant to say was, “Rebecca” and “Suspicion” are the same movie.
Wrong again, dumbass.
I suspect he didn’t watch any of them. He just noticed that Joan Fontaine was in both “Rebecca” and “Suspicion”, and figured that was enough to conclude they were the same.